Nearly a decade ago, I purchased an eight court volleyball facility in south Calgary that had basically gone bankrupt. After buying out the debt and adding more than $1-million in upgrades — including almost $400,000 in provincial and municipal grants — Rally Pointe is now in the black and is considered one of North America’s finest volleyball complexes. Last year, it celebrated its 10th anniversary and one-millionth visitor, a significant milestone that reflects its impact on Calgary’s sport and recreation community.

Helping this facility to profitablity and sustainability has helped advance volleyball in Alberta. It has the second highest participation numbers of any sport in the world after soccer, and Calgary is no exception. Teen boys and girls, and adults of all ages, are devoted to the game. More than 1,500 athletes train at Rally Pointe throughout each week in recreational and competitive leagues.

Participation in amateur sport provides a human building block, helping to grow self-esteem, leadership and teamwork, essential qualities for a successful life, however you define it.

While Rally Pointe is covering its costs, it’s still not financing my retirement plans. But it has allowed me to blend my entrepreneurial skill set with my philanthropic mind set.

My passion for promoting volleyball as a sport has both business and philanthropic motivations. There is huge un-mined potential in private-public partnerships, and most of the business community is missing this opportunity to build community-minded business models that build positive social outcomes and generate economic returns.

By offering some insight into how to do it, I hope to get this issue on more people’s radar screens.

So here’s another example: In 2006, the Calgary Dawgs, an amateur baseball team without a field to play on approached the Town of Okotoks, just south of Calgary, with a proposal to build a stadium complex if suitable land could be found.

The idea immediately found support from the progressively thinking mayor and town council. The Dawgs (with the support of philanthropists Don and Doc Seaman) would fund the stadium, Nexen Energy would provide the land and the town would provide the infrastructure (parking lot, utility tie-ins, landscaping, etc.). In 2007, the $8-million Seaman Stadium with capacity for 2,600 people opened its doors.

One of the best of its kind in Canada, the complex is completely dedicated to amateur athletics and has expanded to include facilities for youth and bantam players. These facilities were in large part funded by the Seamans’ brothers along with local entrepreneur Michael Rose and Tourmaline Oil Corp. Interest in baseball has exploded in the area since the arrival of the Dawgs in Okotoks; registration in youth baseball has more than quadrupled. The Dawgs’ draw nearly 2,000 fans every game and its youth academy program now draws players from across North America.

As a not-for-profit, the Dawgs use revenue from their collegiate team summer games to improve and expand the facilities for the benefit of the academy teams all year round.

There are many opportunities for entrepreneurs to build and run these sorts of facilities, creating modestly profitable ventures that support amateur sport. Critics are skeptical about advancing private-public partnerships because they often appear to allow for the subsidization of private business.

That perspective is short-sighted at best. As governments have fewer dollars to allocate toward discretionary spending on programs such as amateur sport, private-public partnerships are essential.

Through partnerships with municipalities and sports/culture organizations, entrepreneurs can make their community investment initiatives profitable while helping improve access to facilities for culture and amateur sport. By taking an entrepreneurial approach to building these facilities, and inviting municipalities and community organizations to participate, everyone wins, especially amateur athletes/artists and their families.

As we enter another Olympic year, which highlights the significance of developing amateur sport in Canada, this issue needs to move higher on our priority list. We have an enormous opportunity to direct the deep pockets of wealth across North America toward investing in major infrastructure, essential for the long-term growth of people and communities.

Here’s a challenge to my colleagues: How might you use your business know-how and networks to help build infrastructure in your community?

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